Cook County Commission on Social Innovation

There is no public comment. Minutes of previous meetings approved.

Thalia Valdivia is introduced by Alma Anaya as the new assistant for this commission. She is currently a senior at UIC.

There is also another update on remote meetings. While there has been an extension on the emergency order by the governor to host remote meetings, there will be more opportunities to host meetings in person.

There is an introduction for the principal witness for today which is Mark Elsdon, a pastor and expert in the field of underutilized church properties. He is most known for his book: “We aren’t broke: uncovering hidden resources for mission and ministry”.

He begins his presentation stressing that there are currently thousands of churches closing and changing ownership/purpose. There is great concern about what will happen to the social resources/spaces that churches provide in communities. Additionally.. https://t.co/g8JgE7ZFAi

Churches are being sold to private developers which can cause a redistribution of wealth in communities.

He goes on with a personal story from his time in Madison, WI. A student at UWM that had several relapses in heroin. Press house, who was being led by Mark at the time, was able to give the student the help they needed and they were able to make a full recovery and graduate.

Press House is a church-run development that was built in a parking lot in an underutilized worship space. Mark states that the student who recovered from heroin was able to benefit from denominational grant & other resources, all run by a church. https://t.co/SZD7U6do0b

Overall, Mark stresses that houses of worship fill enormous gaps in resources and organizations that aid communities who have been systemically marginalized and are suffering from social issues such as opioid addiction.

Houses of worship today are suffering from the decline of membership, who’s attendance heavily impacts the reduce in budgets, and outdated financial models.

However, there is great value in houses of worship and the connections they have in a community. Houses of worship, even those who are smaller in size, have great access to community members and mobilizing capabilities.

Some of the functions houses of worships serve in communities are: food banks, places for non-profit, safe places for youth, and addiction help, affordable housing, etc.

As Mark explains, the trend of the closing and repurposing of churches is undeniable and on the rise. He believed the new focus should be on what happens next and what should be the next steps to make sure these spaces are still useful.

An example he gives of how individual churches have overcome these challenges is of two churches in WI who merged and sold one of the buildings and used the proceeds to build affordable housing on its campus.

However these examples of repurposed houses of worship are few and far between because of issues with zoning and legal issues with adaptive uses (historic landmark guidelines). This is in addition to the competition churches have with developers who want to build high end housing

Overall, Mark believe that it is worth to help houses of worship maintain their places in communities and repurpose their presence and abilities to provide communities with the most resources.

There is a question by Comm. Males about what the churches in the Chicago area look like. While Mark is not able to provide any figures, he believes the trend is consistent in Chicago as well. Mark has also agreed to partner with the commission to identify churches in Chicago.

There is a question about what the commission can do to help this idea and who would lead this project. Mark emphasized that this project would require a partnership of civic, private, & government services and some good next steps to take would be to talk to local denom. leaders

Comm. Malone believes that there are conversations to be held with cook county land authority and the assessor in order to get a full evaluation of the condition of churches/faith based facilities. Esp. because there is variation in who pay taxes.

Comm. Malone also mentions that the commission does have some asset mapping org. in mind to help with the project. Mark brings up that in WI, he has not had much policy progress because this is a new and developing issue.

Other possible next steps include bringing together faith based org. with non-profit org. that may want to operate out of houses of worship or need the space.

Comm. Yonan also brings up that since he is already a part of the management of some of the cook county’s assets, he would be more than happy to help.

Several commissioners volunteer to help this initiative given the benefits these spaces can bring to communities, and they will be following up with Mark.

There is a presentation by Comm. DeLaurentis about the Southland Reactivation Act. https://t.co/JutDX23zeZ

This initiative is to bring new development into communities that have been heavily disinvested in and need to attract new developers to revitalize properties and bring in jobs. These pictures are of Harvey, IL, which demonstrate the grave need for this initiative. https://t.co/h8XqjRG8Pg

https://t.co/3niOdeaZPs

This bill is currently waiting for the last vote before the session ends, which should be done between today and tomorrow.

There is a lot of excitement from the commissioners about the initiative. Several commissioners congratulate Comm. DeLaurentis for her work in bringing together various organizations to bring economic development into the south suburbs.

There is mention about the partnership of the commission with the Obama foundation and how this initiative comes at great timing because of all of the working group reports that will need to made soon.

Several commissioners are already forming a working group for Mark Elsdon’s proposal.

Meeting adjourned at 5:32pm.